Your post raises a couple of points I welcome discussion on re rake comparisons and deposit bonuses. (A reasoned discussion on this topic is unfortunately rare in my experience, thanks for bringing it up)
Your deposit clearing points are valid. My tieing of "bonus clearing" to rake structure also was intended to point out however that ("no bonus credit" for an unraked $5.00 pot at Truepoker) may be preferable to getting (a Bonus credit while paying rake on that same pot elsewhere). An analysis of overall return from play must consider win rates, plus each rake $.50 saved as well as each bonus dollar earned.
I
"mentioning that TruePoker doesn't rake higher limit pots below $20, and that you can multitable, these are not particularly competitive selling points anymore,"
You may be right about market inelasticity with respect to rake structures (or is that elasticity, I forget ... just call it relative insensitivity).
What I was trying to highlight is that our definition of a raked hand would not include pots other sites routinely rake for up to $.75, while "returning" a deposit bonus based on those pots at around $.10 in value. Our structure allows the winner of "small, i.e unraked, pots" to keep the $.50 (Party at $5.00) or $ .75 or whatever.
You may be right about there being no competitive advantage to advertising or keeping our current structure. As part of our adoption of chips below $1.00 in value (in development currently), we will likely revisit our rake structure to get in line with the "standard" $.25/$5.00 step increases, as well as micro-limits et cetera.
Comments are welcome at
management@truepoker.com
II
"raking a full dollar at $12 pots in $1/2 limit yields a maximum 8.3% drop for True Poker...not a great deal either"
I do disagree re your analysis to point out that a fair comparison would have to credit that same player with whatever comparative "nonraked" benefits he/she got at Truepoker on all pots won between $5.00 and $11.75. Those quarters and $.50 rakes lower on the distribution of pot sizes do add up. A Truepoker player does not pay those and we do not collect them. In other words a comparison of 8.3% AT $12 must be adjusted for 0% at $5.00 to $11.75 sized pots.
Truepoker Management